Over the past several years there has been increasing concern over the availability and use of firearms in society and the resultant increase in violence. These concerns have led to the introduction of legislation to limit access to firearms or for the registration and identification of such firearms.
However, identification relating to firearm does not often lead to an identification of the firearm used in a violent crime since the firearm may not be left at the scene or may not be recovered. Therefore, the connection between the firearm used and the owner of the firearm cannot be made. In addition, even if the firearm is recovered it may have been stolen and identification of the firearm does not produce the user of the firearm. Also stolen firearms can be altered easily to remove forms of identification.
Therefore, to make identification of users of firearms more likely there is a need for a means of tying the user of a firearm to a crime scene. The means should be inexpensive, easy to implement and not easily removed.
Attempts have been made to provide identification means in bullets. However, such prior attempts at bullet identification have been difficult to incorporate into a bullet, have been subject to damage upon discharging the bullet from a firearm, and are difficult to recover from a discharged bullet.
Still another difficulty with respect to bullet identification systems is the susceptibility to fraud and counterfeiting. Traditional identification systems fail to even address this problem. Accordingly, it is possible for persons desiring to circumvent the bullet identification system by producing counterfeit bullets. A system is therefore needed to preserve and maintain the integrity of an identification system. This would be particularly important if bullet registration is required by law in the future.